Perception systems for safeguarding and localization of autonomous and semi-autonomous vehicles may utilize many different sensing modalities, such as, for example, laser devices, color cameras, thermal cameras, ultrasonic devices, and radar devices, to detect obstacles and localize the vehicles in their operating environment. However, many environmental conditions may exist that will retard or reduce the effective range of these perception systems. For instance, cameras and other types of optical sensors may not be able to penetrate obscurants such as dust, smoke, and fog. In addition, topographical features of the terrain within the operating environment may also make it impossible for the perception systems to make observations out to their nominal maximum range.